


Days

by Shabby Abby (KJPearl)



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: Break Up, Dancing, Dresses, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Explosions, F/F, FatT Femslash Week, FatT Femslash Week 2018, Fireworks, Formalwear, Grief/Mourning, Mechs, Pilots, Promises, Robbery, Spring, Tactile
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-06-14 20:43:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15397062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KJPearl/pseuds/Shabby%20Abby
Summary: FatT Femlash collection1. Spring/Winter: Castille/Rebecca2. Devil's Bargain: Hella/Adelaide3. Dance/Disguise: Miss Salary/Caroline4. Stealing Time: Tea/Natalya5. Hands: Gray/Demani6. Love's First Explosion: Aria/Jacqui7. Promises/Keepsakes: Open/Tender





	1. Winter/Spring: Castille/Rebecca

//Winter//

Winter was long, and cold, Castile had learnt, she couldn’t rememberer quite when. She knew it hadn’t been the case in the long ago days when she went by Charter. Back when she lived in the north the snow elves understood winter. It was a part of them ingrained deep in their nature. And Marielda had never used to be so cold. Back when Samothes rules it he kept it warm with his sun. After… everything, when Samot took over, Marielda became more temperate. Winter came in with the cool breezes from the north and snow fell.

Castille experienced winter in her stone body for the first time almost exactly six months after Samothes died. She left the tomb on one of her rare excursions to get fruit. She loved fruit, though she couldn’t eat it, there was something therapeutic about peeling it. Oranges were her favourite, but out of season. Instead she got an apple, from the tail end of Nacre’s fall harvest. What Castille didn’t like as much was the cold, it riddled itself deep in her stone body, making her limbs and joints feel tense and tight. Distracted by the odd feeling she didn’t notice Rebecca approaching, otherwise she would have avoided the Lance Noble just as she avoided everyone she knew these days.

“Hello,” Rebecca said.

“Uh, hi.”

“I haven’t seen you around much anymore. Have you given up causing trouble at last?” she teased.

“I guess you could say that,” Castille replied more seriously than the question demanded, “I think I’ve had my fill. After you kill god there’s not really much to do.”

Rebecca gave her a pitying look, maybe she had noticed the tremble Castille couldn’t keep out of her voice.

“Anyway, I should go,” Castille said.

“Perhaps we could meet again,” Rebecca suggested.

Castille have her a disbelieving look.

“Just to keep an eye on you, make sure you’re staying out of trouble,” Rebecca explained.

“Yeah, no thanks. I’m fine on my own,” Castille turned to walk away.

“Or, just as friends,” she blurted out, “That was what you wanted before, right? And now we’re not on opposite sides.”

“I didn’t want to be  _ just _ friends,” Castille said.

“More than friends works too,” Rebecca blushed.

“Oh,” Castille paused, “I… I do like you, but I lost someone recently. I still need time.”

“I can be patient, as you know” Rebecca smiled, “For now how about a lunch as just friends and we’ll see how it goes.”

“Yeah. That sounds nice.”

//Spring//

It took time, but they had plenty. Seasons passed; from winter to spring; from mourning to growth.

Castille still spent more time then was healthy in the tomb, contemplating her greatest mistake, but Rebecca lured her out with promises of new imported fruits and wines as Samot expanded Marielda’s trades further and further, into his Plains of Celebration.

It was awkward at times, after Rebecca had run ins with Caroline and Miss Salary. She would try complain about their crimes and Castille was more likely to empathise with them then her. She remembered her own time in the six and mentoring Caroline after Hitchcock welcomed the girl into the fold. She was young, optimistic, more of a duelist than a dancer. Castille hoped she made it out of the business less broken than her own friends had.

Still their dinners were nice, the late nights spent trying to draw out one of Rebecca’s rare blushes with her shameless flirtations. Rebecca in turn liked to hold her hand, such a simple intimacy yet it surprised Castille every time. Their time together was slow and patient. So different from her rushed brunches with Maelgwyn. She liked it that way. One spring sunset, light brushing orange across their table Castille felt happy in a way she hadn't been since long before Samothes’ death. She was calm and safe and most importantly hopeful. They had plenty of time. After all, it was only spring and the seasons stretched endlessly before them.


	2. Devil's Bargain: Hella/Adelaide

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU for the end of AiH

Hella had never expected to end up here, some island where people didn’t die right. Where  _ she _ hadn’t died right. The god’s words haunted her. He wanted her to kill Calhoun, or, Angelo she supposed. She’d said yes of course, what else could she do when faced with death. She was Ordennan, the only crime worse than death was treason. And yet when she’d gone to visit him in his cell, looked into his eyes and seen the hopelessness and acceptance, she couldn't bear it. Not that it wasn't deserved. She had betrayed him. If she hadn’t just accepted his capture, if she’d really tried to save him, he wouldn't be here in the first place. She couldn't kill him. There had to be another way.

That evening she went to speak with her, Adelaide the Queen of Nacre. When she requested an audience with the queen, barely hoping her desperate plan would work, she was shocked that they allowed it. But they did, and she was let into the throne room with little trouble. She supposed Nacre was a city which didn’t generally have much to fear from an assassination, and they’d taken away her blade of Ordennan steel. Hella wondered if she should warn them that with enough determination she was certain she could kill the queen, sword or not. But that was not why she was here.

The first thing Hella noticed was how tired she seemed. Adelaide was hunched over her desk reviewing documents. She raised her head when Hella entered and gave her a confused but polite smile, “What can I do for you?”

“Um,” Hella took a deep breath, “This is going to sound ridiculous, or maybe not to you, but there’s something I didn’t tell you in our last meeting. Something I probably should have. I died, in that battle earlier, with Brandish. Your father let me back.”

“Oh?” Adelaide’s face betrayed nothing, “My father has been known to make exceptions, take a fancy to certain mortals, especially in Nacre.”

“It’s not like that. He didn’t just let me back. We made a deal.”

“And what did you agree to?”

“I promised him I’d kill Calhoun.”

Adelaide’s calm broke, for just an instant her face contorted in sorrow, “How could you?”

“Well, that’s the second part of the problem,” Hella felt the tears returning, just as they had in the cell with Calhoun, “I can’t. I can’t just kill him, he’s my friend. He trusted me, before all this, I can’t betray that more than I already have. But I made an oath… I don’t know what to do.”

“Oh. I see,” Adelaide sighed in exhaustion, “There might be a way.”

“What?” Hella demanded, “I’ll do anything.”

“Perhaps in the future you should be more careful with your promises, fighter.”

Hella looked away, embarrassed. 

“While my father may rule death in the world beyond, I do have some authority here as ruler of Nacre,” Adelaide explained, “While you stay in Nacre he will not be able to take you, I will ensure it.”

“And when I want to leave?”

“You seem to forget you are a prisoner here, that is not a decision for you to make,” Adelaide returned to her work, clearly dismissing Hella. Unfortunately, Hella had never really been known for respecting authority.

“I will get off this island eventually. Either I convince you or I escape, it doesn't matter. This isn’t a game! My life isn’t a toy for you to play with! Can you help or not?”

“If you want to know, honestly,” Adelaide turned to her, burning with a quiet rage, “I have no idea. There may be some method, buried deep in an old tome, but I don’t know of it. At the moment I’m offering you everything I can and you throw it back in my face! You have the gall to come here after fighting my soldiers, threatening my people and myself and make demands of me, Hella Veral. You are lucky I show you the mercy I do.”

While her words were fierce. there was something about her speech - the way her chest rose and fell shakily with each furious breath she took, the way her eyes looked so sad beneath it all - that just made Hella want to comfort her. She wasn’t sure how to respond. The joke slipped out almost accidentally, “I am lucky. I guess sometimes even the Queen of Death can make an exception, take a fancy to a mortal.”

“You-” Adelaide seemed to be torn between being furious and amused. In the end the later won out and she burst into laughter.

“Go back to your room for tonight, fighter, we can speak more about this in the morning.”

“I look forward to it,” Hella smirked before growing serious for a moment, “But honestly, thank you. I understand it can be hard to defy your father.”

“My brother managed to set quite an example in that department,” Adelaide said with a wry smile.

“Yeah, I guess he did,” Hella paused, “Are you really going to kill him?”

“I don’t know,” Adelaide ran a hand through her hair, “I’ve been trying to find some kind of loophole, but there aren’t many options. I just have to hope we can give him a trial with a shot of winning the people's sympathy.”

“I hope it works,” Hella said as she began to leave, “Just don’t forget to take a break from saving him and actually speak to him sometimes. He’s missed you.”

“I’ve missed him too.” 


	3. Dance/Disguise: Miss Salary/Caroline Fair-Play

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dancing and Disguises, though mostly dancing, with Caroline and Miss Salary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This may be the cliche pairing for this prompt but that's only because it works so well. And at least from the wiki miss salary has no other name so we're just hoping/pretending salary is her first name

Caroline Fair-Play-is-a-Fool’s-Game had always been a good dancer. The careful grace she had honed by fighting combined with the lessons her class-climbing parents had provided left her no other option. She knew every dance performed in Marielda ballrooms and it had helped her and Miss Salary with their crimes on more occasions then seemed reasonable. Of course Salary had a habit of finding them knowledge in fancy mansions. Moreover, she never passed up the distraction of a party to pull of a heist. 

A party just like the High Sunday Feast hosted by the Hard-Work-Safe-House family. They had snuck in through a window since, hard as Salary had tried, she hadn’t been able to get them invited to the exclusive party. Still, once they made it in, dressed in their best formal wear, no one would suspect a thing. Salary wore one of her old dresses, tight and yellow with black detailing, from her Yellow House days. She’d always worried she looked like a bee in the colors, but Caroline seemed to like it. Or at the very least had laughed and said, “It’s not even striped,” when Salary brought up her concern. Between that and the way that Caroline’s eyes always followed the well-tailored curve of the dress over her hips, she wasn’t ready to throw it out just yet.

Not that Salary could even think about her own appearance when she saw Caroline in her new dress. After they’d torn the last one on a mission — well, not really during the mission so much as the party afterwards — Caroline had gone to buy a new one with some of their ill gotten gains. She had refused to let Salary see it, claiming it was a surprise, and gods if it wasn't unfair to spring it on Salary right before the mission. She could barely remember how she’d made it into the house, especially considering that she hadn’t taken her eyes off Caroline since the reveal. The top was a low, draping scoop, which swept out into a bottom made up of layers upon layers of a translucent gauzy fabric that seemed to almost float around Caroline. She looked ethereal, almost unreal, as it twirled around her with every step. Salary had pulled her close and kissed her when she first saw it, partly just to reassure herself that Caroline was real. And she was, utterly real and utterly lovely.

Now the two stood at the hors d'oeuvres table making idle talk with the hostess. She was making an admirable attempt at hiding the fact she had no idea who they were. In fact, if Salary hadn't just come through a window, she might have even believed it. She wondered how many people the lady had used this act on in the evening, whether her and Caroline would even stand out in a list of people who shouldn’t have been there when the Lance Nobles arrived and began digging. They’d given fake names just in case, but Salary didn’t think anyone would remember those by the end of the night. They weren’t here to make an impression. Just get the books and get out. Of course, while they were here they could hardly pass up an opportunity to dance.

Caroline still hadn’t connected the dots, or perhaps she had but had decided not to bring it up. After all, what did it matter if an ordinate amount of their thefts required dancing as part of an overly elaborate plan? It didn’t matter, not to anyone but Salary. She’d always been a passable dancer but she never used to enjoy it, not until she met Caroline. Their first dance had been pure chance. Early in their days in the Six, celebrating a victory, Sige had pulled out a fiddle and they'd all begun to dance. Salary had declined at first but Caroline pulled her in with that overly bright smile she couldn’t resist. Caroline danced as if she hadn’t a care in the world, she held Salary close and gazed into her eyes until she could almost believe they were the only two people in the room. She swayed and spun with a unselfconsciousness that only made Salary like her more. Salary felt as if her love of Caroline increased with every dance. She felt as if dancing could be a metaphor to encapsulate their whole relationship. A careful push and pull, locked together. And if either stumbled they knew the other would be there to help them recover, but more than that, to make it look good.

Salary was pulled back into the present by a tug on her hand and looked up from her glass to see Caroline leading her towards the dance floor with a worried look in her eyes.

“It’s nothing, just lost in thought,” Salary reassured her as she set her glass down.

“Oh? What has you so distracted?” Caroline’s eyes sparkled teasingly as she turned towards the dance floor, making the dress spin around her. Salary felt her heart warm with the knowledge that Caroline knew exactly how distracting she looked tonight and she’d done it entirely on purpose, entirely for her.

“I’ll give you one guess,” Salary said, “It has to do with this woman — stunningly beautiful.”

“A woman,” Caroline mused mock-seriously, “Maybe you should ask her to dance? Just to get it out of your system, make sure you’re not distracted while you’re working tonight.”

“Well, the good news is that she’s already bringing me to dance. The bad news is that I don’t think anything would be enough to get her out of my system,” with that Salary judged they were far enough onto the dance floor and spun them to face each other.

“You always say the sweetest things,” Caroline smiled as she took her hand, putting the other around her waist.

“You inspire me,” Salary said sincerely.

Caroline blushed a deep red. Then they began to dance and lost the breath to speak. Salary let herself get lost in the movement and the woman across from her. Dancing through life with Caroline as her partner, she had no doubt they would succeed at everything they tried.


	4. Stealing Time: Tea/Natalya

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was hard to find time. Good thing Natalya had never been too concerned with legality. She would steal moments where she could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the plot of this is fairly incoherent so sorry about that; just think of it as a series of scenes smushed together

Natalya liked to watch Tea sleep. She knew how creepy that might sound, but that didn’t make it any less true. Tea was soft in sleep in a way she rarely let herself be while awake. It was rare that the leader of the Queen’s Gambit let herself relax. She was an OriCon girl through and through. Time was money. During the war time was life and wasting it could cause your death. Natalya had noticed the unhealthy trend towards overworking among all the OriCon soldiers on their trip. Orth had taken pills so that he could stop sleeping entirely. Natalya didn’t doubt Tea would do the same if such drugs didn’t slow reflexes, even the minuscule change of the high end drugs Orth had could be fatal for as daring a pilot as Tea. Still she slept about as little as she could and avoided free time like the plague. If she wasn’t out battling in her mech, she would be found repairing and upgrading her mech or planning out new formations for her the Queen’s Gambit.

Well either that or with Natalya. Early in the mission the two had addressed their mutual attraction and decided to begin an arrangement for stress release. But at some point it had become more then that. Tea had a sharp wit and mind for strategy hidden beneath her brash exterior. She had a eye for mech design and coding as much as mech fighting. Natalya had begun sharing her thoughts on ship maintenance and war strategy with Tea and quickly found herself consulting Tea regularly. Tea was far more willing to take risks than Natalya, and would sometimes suggests the most absurd plans, things so far outside the box they had never occured to Natalya. Usually, with just a bit tweaking, the plans worked. Natalya didn’t want to think of how many times they’d made it out of a near disaster due some half-joke plan from Tea Kenridge.

While they may have worked well together, that wasn’t what really drew Natalya to Tea. No it was over shared lunches or stolen minutes that she found herself beginning to fall in love. It was Tea with her guard down, teasing Rethal or comforting a rookie, that broke down Natalya's defenses. She remembered the first time Tea invited her to sit with her at dinner.

“Greaves!” she’d yelled across the mess hall. Natalya, still ill at ease in her fairly new cover on the ship had jumped and panicked for a wild minute that she was back at the academy about to get in trouble for some infinitesimally small but unfathomably important mistake she’d made. Then she’d regained her senses and simply turned to raise an eyebrow at Tea.

“I’ve been saving you a seat!” Tea gave her a wide grin, “It would be a shame for you to sit all the way over there!”

Natalya didn’t have quite enough confidence to yell anything back across the room, in fact she felt herself blushing slightly at the number of eyes already directed on her, so she quietly made her way over to Tea.

“See Jace,” Tea smirked to the man who sat on her other side, “Told you Natalya wouldn’t pass up an offer to sit with the best pilots in the sector.”

“Or she was just too polite to turn you down in front of the whole crew,” Jace replied.

“No, Tea is right. I just love to bask in the glory of pilots, hoping their fame will one day trickle down to me,” Natalya deadpanned as she took her seat. A few members of the table looked at her as if they couldn’t tell if she was serious but both Rethal and Tea laughed. 

“She’s even funnier than you, Tea, I see why you like her,” Jace had said. Natalya still remembered it as the first moment she’d considered it, Tea liking her as more than friends. She quickly discovered she liked the idea very much.

Still it was hard to find time. Good thing Natalya had never been too concerned with legality. She would steal moments where she could; dropping into the Gambit’s mech bay when she judged her work could last without her for a few minutes without escalating itself into catastrophe, making breakfast the morning after their hookups, spending lunch and dinner together whenever their schedules aligned, and sometimes watching Tea sleep. 

Tea was such a vibrant presence in her life. Her focused energy all directed at Natalya during their conversations made Natalya feel as though she really was someone worthy of such attention. Tea seemed to have that effect on everyone, or at least everyone who she let passed the harsh walls of her judgement. Once Natalya had snuck into the mech bay to meet Tea at her mech. She paused when she heard voices echoing out of the room.

“I just miss her,” someone was saying.

“You can write letters,” Tea suggested.

“I do, one every week,” the voice replied, “And she responds. We talk about… well everything. That’s part of what I love about her, we talk to each other about everything. But what if she’s found someone else? Someone prettier or smarter or closer.”

“Vivian,” Tea said, “I sincerely doubt your fiance who writes you weekly letters is off starting an affair. I’m certain she misses you as much as you miss her.”

“I suppose so,” the voice, now identified as Vivian Stellar, a younger member of the Queen’s Gambit Natalya recalled from their lunches, said. Stellar was a good pilot, carefully circumspect both in and out of the cockpit. Natalya had at first though Tea would see her as weak. Then she found out Tea had actually taken the girl under her wing, running drills with her to help her become more flexible within her own piloting style. There was after all a reason Tea had been given a command position. She was more than just a good pilot, she was also a good leader.

“Just think,” Tea continued, “You’re doing this for her and-”

“I’m doing it for the good of the sector,” Stellar interjected. 

“Bull,” Tea snorted, “Everyone says they're here for the sector and everyone’s a damn liar. We’re all here for someone or something. Fighting to protect a loved one is not the worst reason to be here. Just think, you’re doing this for here and soon you’ll be back together and these worries will seem foolish.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Stellar sounded reassured, “Thanks, Tea.”

Tea didn’t respond. She wouldn’t. She wasn't a fan of mushy sentiments like thanks. The next sound Natalya heard was Stellar walking away. She took that as he cue to enter.

“How long have you been spying?” Tea asked without looking over her shoulder.

“No time at all,” Natalya said, “That was some good advice you gave. What do you fight for?”

“No time at all, huh?” Tea sighed but her smile betrayed her, “I fight because I like it. And I figure doing it to help the sector is better than the shit I used to get into. And you?”

“I don’t know? Sometimes I feel like I got dragged into this war all by virtue of being the idiot who built this ship.”

“So it’s penance?”

“I suppose,” Natalya had never thought of it that way but she supposed Tea was right. With her knowledge, with the weapons she could - and at times did - create she had no right to live as an ordinary citizen, uninvolved in all this mess.

“But enough of that heavy bullshit,” Tea said, “Did you see that abomination Sokrates wore last time they came to talk to Orth on ship?”

“The sequins!” Natalya agreed, “I’m surprised no one was blinded.”

And just for a moment they could pretend they were normal people, with normal lives and normal gossip rather than soldiers in a desperate war.


	5. Hands: Gray/Demani

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short fic for today

A sigh. A brush of hands. Sunlight over a beloved face. It was these moments Gray had never thought she would get, and these moments she cherished so deeply. When they’d first rebelled against the Rapid Evening Gray had hardly dared hope they’d survive. The fact that they now had the Steady was beyond her wildest dreams from back then.

Demani woke slowly. She always woke slowly these days, no longer shocked awake by nightmares. They were safe, and slowly learning that. Gray didn’t sleep, per se, but she did reduce functions. She shut down her robotic body and narrowed her awareness to the security cameras, keeping an eye on the few patrons still awake. There was always someone with the Steady; people arriving from different day cycles, transporters working late nights, spies looking for a moment of refuge wherever they could take it. 

Gray liked to wake up with Demani. She would return to her body sensors, reaching an arm around Demani and kissing her. It had become routine in the mornings when they could, when chaos didn’t interrupt them in that way it tended to, for them to take time. Slow and gentle they could wake up together.

Working throughout the day they would bump in and out of each other's orbits. When passing they would brush hands in greeting, reassurance, and promise. It was strange to Gray, unused to her newfound body and proximity to others. She was slowly learning she liked the tactility. Touching Demani gave them a kind of connection Gray wasn't sure she’d ever felt before. Close and connected by their bodies, and more than that, their love.  She could image in visible above them, superimposed upon reality. Wrapped up in each other’s arms, close enough that the boundaries between them merged, until the separation between them almost didn’t exist, Gray felt connected to Demani in way she knew she’d never felt before.

She also loved watching Demani work with her hands. Demani was beautiful to Gray always, but there was something special in watching her work. The calm competency with which she would direct customers, chop vegetables, make drinks, hack a foreign server, break up a fight. The knowledge that the same hands which handled Gray so gently could just as easily be used as weapons, but wouldn’t. 


	6. Love's First Explosion: Jacqui/Aria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With this prompt you know who it's going to be

“Hurry!” Aria called back, and Jacqui did, rushing after her. She often found herself rushing after her excitable wife, but she didn’t mind. Jacqui wasn’t one to push beyond the status quo. She tended to live in a state of contentment when left to her own devices. That wasn’t necessarily bad, although it was much more boring. Aria would say the two were one and the same.

Aria couldn’t abide by routine, her revolutionary soul demanded change and innovation in every area of her life. It was most obvious in her work as Executive Joie, overhauling the mess of Counter/Weight’s government to bring justice to those who lived in the domes. But it seeped outside too, sometimes with mixed results, like the time she had decided peanut butter and jelly was tired and made the kids peanut butter and pickle sandwiches. While it had become Cassy’s favourite food, Robin and Bella had come home furious. Aria had just given them that apologetic look she had down to an art and promised to return to the beloved classic.

“Jacqui, we’re going to miss it!”

“I’m hurrying, babe,” Jacqui responded, “Maybe if someone hadn’t spent and extra half hour fixing her hair...”

“I found a grey hair, Jacqui! I had to see if there were more. It warranted thorough investigation!” Aria said.

“And what was the committee’s verdict?” Jacqui teased.

“Just the one! Now let’s stop talking and pick up the pace.”

So they did, running at a furious pace until they finally reached the clearing. They stopped and begun to laugh, broken up by pants to catch their breath.

“God this is so high-school,” Jacqui wheezed, feeling euphoric in the fresh night air, sneaking out with her wife for a poorly planned date night. Between the babysitter cancelling at the last minute, the grey hair catastrophe, and a minor breakdown as they tried to leave the house, Jacqui had almost doubted they'd make it. Almost, but not quite because if there was one thing their family had in spades it was foolhardy stubbornness. So Jacqui had wrangled Orth into babysitting with the promise that the kids had recently discovered the Heiron series and needed someone to binge it with, reassured a panicking Aria that her hair was still brown and anyway she could dye it, and told Robin that Orth would order pizza for dinner. And now they were here, on  a grassy hilltop giggling like teenagers. Jacqui couldn’t be happier.

“It is!” Aria agreed, “Sneaking out to go make out in the woods, just like in the movies!”

Aria didn’t acknowledge it much, but starting at Joypark so young had cut short her adolescence in many ways. While most kids were in high school, carefree and stupid, Aria had already begun building herself an image and brand that couldn’t be risked for the sake of a hookup. Jacqui reached out to take her hand, “Except you’re even prettier than the girls in the movies.”

Aria blushed slightly, it might have gone unnoticed in the near darkness if Jacqui hadn’t been paying such close attention to her face, and squeezed Jacqui’s hand back.

The first firework went off and they both started, having almost forgotten what they had come out here for in the first place. It was quickly followed by a cluster of red fireworks that loosely formed a heart. Then more and more fireworks in increasingly complicated patterns exploded overhead.

“How did you set this up?” Jacqui asked staring up at the lights raining down around them.

“A few old Joypark friends, you know how I’ve always loved pyrotechnics,” Aria said.

“It’s beautiful,” Jacqui breathed out, “Thank you.”

“You’re more than welcome,” and Aria leaned over to kiss her. It was practiced and comfortable, but still Jacqui felt her heart racing like it did every time. 

"We should dance," Jacqui murmured when they parted.

"I thought you'd never ask," Aria smiled, and a song began to play. It was the first song Aria had ever written for Jacqui. A song, she slowly began to remember, about her love of dancing, explosions and spring. And here she stood on a crisp spring day, fireworks exploding overhead, dancing.

"Oh. Aria, I love it. I love _you_."

"I love you too."


	7. Promises/Keepsakes: Tender/Open

At the end of a relationship there were still always things left behind. Feelings, of course, lingered longer than many liked to acknowledge. Love wasn’t a switch easily turned off, Open was learning the hard way. Tender had betrayed her in every way possible, but there was still a part of Open that longed for her. If she saw the other woman she didn’t trust that she was any more likely to punch her than kiss her. Open had plenty of time to linger on the feelings during the early months of her punishment, after they took her cyberbrain and sent her to Contrition’s Figure. There was little to do but remember and regret.

Early in her plan, when Open had been too nervous to discuss the improbable possibility she could make them divine, she had tried to subtly gauge Tender’s support. Open had been sitting on their sofa with Tender lying across her lap, absentmindedly petting between her ears.

“Tender,” Open had said.

“Yeah?”

“Would you do something for me?”

“Anything,” Tender responded without a second’s hesitation.

“What if it was ridiculous?”

“I can do ridiculous, with you,” Tender twisted around to smirk at her.

“What if it was dangerous?”

“Well that only makes it more fun.” 

“What if it risked losing us everything?”

“Do you have something specific in mind?” Tender asked with concern.

“No,” Open reassured her, “Just idle thoughts.”

“I’m with you, Open,” Tender promised, “all the way. That’s what love is.”

Open remembered being reassured by those words. She’d taken them as Tender’s approval of her work. She had been so wrong to trust in that promise. Because Open could just as easily remember being betrayed by it.

She had told Tender her plan as soon as she was confident it would work. She brought it up, quivering with excitement,  “Do you remember, months ago, when I asked if you would do something for me?”

“Of course,” Tender answered with that guileless expression that meant she probably didn't. Open was too giddy to even call her on the bluff. 

“Well, it’s ready,” Open announced, “I couldn’t tell you before, because I wasn’t sure if it would work, but now I know it will. If we combine our cyberbrains in just the right way, we can become a divine.”

“Why would we want to do that?” Tender laughed hesitantly.

“Why?” Open sputtered, “Why? Because the divines are dying Tender! Anticipation is gone already. We need a new divine, something that can lead us out of this darkness.”

“And you think  _ we _ could do that?” Tender asked, her tone making it absolutely clear she did not.

“Of course,” Open said, “We work so well in the mesh, and our teamwork is perfect, that's the only reason we could even become a single divine. We’ve worshipped Anticipation, we know all about devotion, and we love the people of the Fleet. Why couldn’t we do it?”

“It’s wrong! Your plan is ridiculous, it’s dangerous, it could lose us everything! This isn't right Open, what you’re proposing is…” Tender trailed off with a shudder.

“But, you promised,” Open found herself repeating it over and over, “you promised, you promised, you promised.”

How had it gone so wrong? Tender was supposed to agree with her plan and join her to save the Fleet together. Tender was supposed to be with her all the way. Tender was supposed to love her.

“I didn’t mean this,” Tender said, aghast, “I didn’t promise this, Open. I’m sorry.”

Open revisited that scene over and over during her imprisonment, trying to find the flaw in her argument and imagining alternatives where she had convinced Tender. Eventually she realized it was futile. There was nothing she could have done. Open had fundamentally misunderstood Tender as a person. Tender would never want to be divine and even more so would never want to become a half of a larger whole. She valued her self far too much to give it up. 

By the time she was released Open had given up on eternally reviewing memories, only to come face to face with the other pieces that remained of their relationship. Open returned to their apartment to find it exactly the same, except for the fact that Tender wasn’t there. Open found herself face to face with the stove Tender used to fry them eggs on, the knicknacks she accumulated on the mantlepiece, the balls of yarn she secretly loved to play with, the sofa where Open had once taken a promise far too seriously.

She tried, for a while, to live in that house again. She couldn’t, it was haunted by memories of Tender she simply couldn’t bear. In the end the only thing Open kept from her relationship with Tender was absence. The absence of her cyber brain and absence of Tender herself.


End file.
